Altoid Tin Etching Tutorial

October 23, 2011 by 20 Comments

Eminent steampunker [Jake Von Slatt] wrote a small article on etching candy tins for The Steampunk Bible, but the limited space available in the book didn’t allow for a full exposition. To make amends for his incomplete tutorial, he posted this walk through to compliment the Bible’s article.

The process is very similar to the many tutorials we’ve seen on home-etching PCBs using the toner transfer method. Removing the paint from the Altoid tin, creating a mask, printing it on the Sunday circulars, and taking an iron to the tin is old hat for home fabbers.

Unlike PCB manufacturing, [Mr. Von Slatt] doesn’t bother with Ferric Chloride or other nasty chemicals – he does everything with electrolysis. After adding a few tablespoons of table salt to a bucket of water, [Jake] takes a DC power supply and connects the positive lead to the lid and the negative lead to the base. a bit of electrical tape around the corners of the lid keeps the metal from getting too thin.

A nice Copper finish can be applied to a finished tin by swabbing on a solution of Copper Sulfate – a common ingredient in “Root Kill” products. Of course that’s not a necessary step; you can easily enjoy and elegant Altoid tin bare metal.

Wooden Retro Keyboard Build

November 3, 2008 by 14 Comments

[phirzcol] sent us this cool step by step build of a retro looking keyboard, Inspired by [Von Slatt] and his work. [phirzcol] starts with a standard keyboard and removes the keys. He steams some wood to wrap the keyboard, then finishes it off nicely. The process of making the keys looks pretty grueling. Each key has 4 parts which have to be hand cut and assembled. A blue accent light is a nice touch as well.  The keyboard looks pretty good, but we’d like to try typing on it for a while to see how usable it is.  If it looks like too much effort, you can actually buy it on ebay.

Steampunk: RSS Telegraph, Keybard, Etc.

March 31, 2007 by 9 Comments


[Jake von Slatt] has sent along a few of his projects, but his timing never quite coincides with mine. It’s about time I give this guy some coverage. His latest project was a pair telegraph sounders – he uses them to tap out RSS feeds from his linux box. The amateur radio code requirement in the US has been dropped, but this is probably a great way to practice your Morse code. His keyboard build is definitely one of the most original efforts I’ve seen.

Halloween Props: Flying Crank Ghost

October 13, 2009 by 5 Comments

flying-crank-ghost

[Jake’s] projects have become regular features here on Hack a Day. He keeps the Halloween hack-fest rolling with his Flying Crank Ghost. For the ghost he used a store-bought skull but sculpted some hands himself out of Styrofoam. The body is fashioned from coat hangers with a bit of creepy fabric draped over the hole thing to complete the look.

He added some very convincing motion to the ghoul using a salvaged microwave turntable motor. The motor is mounted in the center of a two crossed boards, and has an armature attached to it. Three strands of monofilament attach to the end of the armature, run through eyelets on the ends of the crossed boards, then attach to the head, and each arm. When the motor is turned on, the armature turns, moving the head and hands up and down at different rates. Take a look at the embedded video after the break to see the final product.

[Jake] does mention that the motor he used is a bit underpowered. We figure this only needs to hold up for one night, so dig through your junk bin and see if you can throw one of these together in a few hours.

Continue reading “Halloween Props: Flying Crank Ghost” →

Hackaday Monday Sipping

July 18, 2005 by 19 Comments

monday sipping

so we got hacked. whatever. ::sips coffee::

stickers and t-shirts have been shipped and they’ll be here before we leave for defcon….so that’s awesome. i’ve also noticed that a ton of you are international readers. i’m trying my best to think of ideas for you guys since you cant get postage and we have to take care of it. we’ll get it done. no worries. defcon should be very interesting after getting hacked. in a good way of course.

today my  friend needs bluetooth installed in his computer. you can bet that it won’t be installed without being done in some messed up way with lights and cabaret.

lemme throw you dogs some hot sausage links though.
nigerian scammers are being punished. oh my god yes.
great guitar modding site. tons of content. [ed]
monitor consumption of your home power. pretty sweet deal if you ask me.
yet another cellphone to handset mod. this one is a bit different. [jake]
one could hardly call this impressive feat of mechanics a “case mod”. [azog]

now this i really love. someone scanned an old LP record in and used a “digital needle” to get the sound off it. how insane. [cosmo]

gen x and the clash members have this new band right? and get this: they want you to download their music for free.

as for hackaday t-shirts, this is what we have:
5 small, 20 medium, 20 large, 15 x-large.

i can say off the bat that 5 of those will be given to certain people which include eliot and i and others. that means there are 55 left. after defcon who knows how many will be left. after that, they will be awarded, not given out. t-shirts cost money to make and we can’t take your money. so thus, expect to see some contests popping up very soon. speaking of which.

today is the end of the contest for a sub-$100 laptop. who has done it? if you have, e-mail (a link to if possible) pics, an about page, and a price list of parts used. we want to see what’s up. the winner will get hackaday fame, some good prizes which will include a t-shirt, stickers, and buttons, and other stuff. you have until 11:59pm to submit submissions. good luck.

Continue reading “Hackaday Monday Sipping” →